Completed. This document summarises input into the design of phase
2 of W3C's Semantic Web Activity. First version: November 2003; latest
revision: August 2004. Updates have been made over the lifetime of the
SWAD-Europe project.
This report was updated following the 2004-06 SWAD-Europe peer review
to include longer descriptions of findings of implementation and
research in the project, updated to June 2004.

Introduction

This SWAD-Europe deliverable 2.2 (project finding input)
summarises SWAD-Europe's input into the planning of the second
phase of W3C's Semantic Web
Activity. Note that it does not attempt a
comprehensive summary of technical issues. Rather, it gives a brief
account of the SWAD-Europe team's involvement in the design
discussions relating to SW Phase 2.

SW Phase 2 planning

A goal of SWAD-Europe, and specifically of Workpackage 2, is to
provide implemention-led input into the standards track work of the
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). As a European project, SWAD-Europe
interacts with the W3C planning process in several ways.

The primary means of interaction is through W3C's public Semantic Web
Interest Group (SWIG), chaired by Dan Brickley. The SWIG provides an
open forum for discussion, debate and information sharing amongst
RDF/Semantic Web developers and users. SWAD-Europe work in the area of
RDF Query and APIs (workpackage 7) and education and outreach
(workpackage 3) has supported ongoing discussion and information
sharing in this forum, through the circulation of technical
reports, the facilitation of online discussion (email, IRC, WWW2003
Birds of a Feather sessions). The role of workpackage 2 is to channel lessons
learned from these discussions into guidance for the W3C team and
W3C Semantic Web Coordination Group. This is primarily facilitated
by the Semantic Web Interest Group chair (Dan Brickley) participating in the
weekly meetings of the W3C SW Coordination Group and of the W3C Semantic
Web team. As W3C's work on RDF Core and Web Ontology draws to a
close, Semantic Web Coordination Group discussions have increasingly
focussed on planning of
phase two of the Semantic Web Activity. Consequently, the period
October/November 2003 has seen an increased amount of design discussion
amongst the Semantic Web Coordination Group regarding priorities and goals
for Semantic Web
phase 2, culminating in the circulation by W3C Team to the Semantic Web
Interest Group of discussion draft charters for possible future work on
RDF Query and RDF Rules.

Workpackage 2 (specifically 2.2) has supported some of this
discussion, particularly liaison with the wider RDF and Semantic
Web developer community. The deliberations of the Semantic Web
Coordination Group
are W3C member confidential and therefore cannot be incorporated in this
report. However the outcome of these discussions and other work
within the W3C Team is manifested in two charter proposals as
circulated to the www-rdf-rules
mailing list of the RDF Interest Group. The timing of these
proposals is beyond the direct control of SWAD-Europe, consequently
this report can only summarise the state of play at the time of
writing.

On November 7th 2003, Semantic Web Interest Group discussion of future
query work was initiated, see (lengthy) discussion thread:
RDF Query -- possible WG charter draft for discussion, Dan
Brickley, Message-ID: <20031107182848.GO26667@w3.org>. A
parallel discussion of possible future work on RDF/SW rules was
also initiated by Sandro Hawke of W3C's SWAD group at
MIT/CSAIL, USA. SWAD-supported discussion is scheduled to continue
through November 20th, at which point the W3C Team and Semantic Web
Coordination Group are
expected to consider this input, refining their proposals in the
light of developer feedback.

Future Work

A proposal for a SWAD-Europe supported workshop on Query (and
possibly Rules) is currently underway within the Semantic Web
Coordination Group. The timing of such a meeting has dependencies
on W3C's evolving design for Working Groups in this area, and
cannot be accurately predicted at this time.

Remaining effort under deliverable 2.2 will be used to help
guide public discussion of the new SW working group proposals, and
to summarise and evaluate developer input.

June 2004 Update

The following summarises the project's continued contributions to the
wider W3C Semantic Web initiative, beyond those originally reported
above.

Following advisory
group discussion, SWAD-Europe elected not to host a
Workshop on RDF Query. Instead, W3C launched the DataAccess group
directly. The WG has a number of inputs from SWAD-Europe and the
commmunity (RDF/SW Interest Group) created through the project. WP7
findings (strawman
query implementation, query
languages survey, as well as the RDF Query (and Rule)
Testcase Repository are now offered to the DA WG. An additional RDF
query implementation ('Rascal', in Redland, by Dave Beckett) was also
supported by the project, as is Dave's membership of the new Working
Group. The Scalability Workshop held by the project also provides
useful background materials for the new Working Group, and (perhaps
more importantly) was a forum where (potential) WG members could get to
know each other in an informal setting.

The new Semantic Web Best
Practices Working Group is also supported through various
SWAD-Europe efforts, in particular through its taskforces.
Three members of the project participate in the group, including Libby
Miller on the Applications and Demos task force, Alistair Miles and Dan
Brickley on the Thesaurus Task
Force. The Thesaurus Task Force has decided to adopt the
SKOS RDF/thesaurus
work of SWAD-Europe (WP8), ensuring some continuation for these key
deliverables following the closure of the project.

The Semantic Blogging work in SWAD-Europe contributed to a W3C team
discussions about possible W3C standardisation of the Atom syndication
format. Atom is, however, now being standardised through the IETF.

The RDF Interest Group has been recharted and relaunched as the W3C Semantic Web Interest
Group, and continues to benefit from SWAD-Europe support, through
providing the primary public fora through which SWAD-Europe engages with
SW developers. A first SWIG face
to face meeting was held in Cannes-Mandelieu, France, with SWAD-Europe
support and participation.

The SWAD-Europe workpackage on Trust, as well as the project's final
workshop on Friend of a
Friend, Social Networking and the Semantic Web are providing useful
input into W3C internal discussions on possible new Activities relating
to Semantic Web. While no new W3C Activities or WGs will be launched
within the lifespan of the SWAD-Europe project, any future work on trust
will be able to draw on the project's public findings and workshop
submissions.

In summary, both of the new Working Groups created by W3C in 2004 are
beginning their work with the benefit of significant contributions from
SWAD-Europe. The relaunched Semantic Web Interest Group, also chaired
with SWAD-Europe support, provides an informal forum through which
wider developer collaborations can feed into formal Working Group
efforts.